I spent a day trying to pay for things with bitcoin and a bar of gold

Ray Dalio, the founder of the largest hedge fund in the world, told Henry Blodget that investors should have 5% to 10% of their portfolio in gold. During that same interview, Dalio called bitcoin a "speculative bubble" and said "bitcoin is not an effective medium exchange by and large" and "it's not easy to buy things with the bitcoin."

Dalio isn't the only one asking these questions about bitcoin. If bitcoin really is a currency, then it is important that you can buy things with it. But this may not be a fair argument. We all seem to accept gold as a storehold of wealth and as an alternative currency even though you really can't make purchases with gold.

So in an effort to fairly compare gold and bitcoin in this vein, we went out into the world to see how easy it was to spend both in everyday transactions. It turns out it isn't easy to spend either. The only person we could find who accepted gold in New York City was Donald Trump in 2011.

But maybe we are simply using the wrong words when we talk about bitcoin. As Adam Ludwin, the founder and CEO of Chain, says in his open letter to Jamie Dimon, "since this isn't about cryptocurrencies vs. fiat currencies let's stop using the word currency." He goes on to say that he prefers to think of them as "crypto assets."

After this video was published a representative reached out on behalf of Subway with the following statement:

"Each local Subway restaurant is independently owned and operated and it is the individual franchisee's decision to accept this form of payment. We are not aware of any restaurants currently accepting this payment."